When mom smoked
She used a filter
Of black & silver.
The distance
From mouth to menthol
Was her intake.
This was style
A mirror to advertising-
Grace with a cigarette
Plugged in. WE
Who inhaled such exhaust
Were sickened years later
By that wand that coughs
In our memory.
David slew Goliath
That power moved through him.
David loved his Solomon, his king.
That love was a dance of weapons and music.
The obvious crown rolled like a rutted wheel
To and fro- subservience to royalty.
That spinning was playful with a dose of jealously.
David as king loved his women
Sending spouses to battle while he
Had his way. That power was seduction.
God’s law was his aura as his body plowed
The air with proclamations. That rule was hypnotic.
David’s musical talents went beyond the lyre-
Women moaned in lust and men wailed in cries
Of war, allegiance.
As old Solomon would split a child for equality
God’s favor he could not balance.
That was inconsistency for a king like David.
Chairman Mao’s Impromptu Visit
Chairman Mao got off the bus today
Dressed in shorts and hoodie.
Looking much like a round faced woman.
Holding a laptop, no red book,
No star on cap. The distance was palatable.
No visible guards. He did not wave or talk
The peoples talk.
Cameras did not flash as they did
When shaking hands with an over coated
Nixon on the Great Wall.
I counted the group around him
But it never added to nine-
More sometimes less, but no gang.
This impromptu stop, his only
Visit to America
Bizarre since he’s been dead for so long.
